


7.04 "Petrolheads 1"

by Suryaofvulcan



Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Virtual Season/Series, Warp 5 Complex Virtual Season 7
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-11-30
Updated: 2007-11-30
Packaged: 2018-08-16 07:06:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8092402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Suryaofvulcan/pseuds/Suryaofvulcan
Summary: The crew of the Enterprise mixes business with pleasure. While Archer works to improve relations between the Boomers and Starfleet, two of his crew decide to enter a shuttlepod in the triennial Boomer Grand Prix.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Kylie Lee, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Warp 5 Complex](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Warp_5_Complex), the software of which ceased to be maintained and created a security hazard. To make future maintenance and archive growth easier, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in August 2016. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but I may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Warp 5 Complex collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Warp5Complex).

  
Author's notes: Beta: Glory  


* * *

"The Boomer Grand Prix?" Commander Charles "Trip" Tucker repeated, not sure if he had heard Ensign Travis Mayweather right. The two of them had just come off shift and were sharing their meal with Lieutenant Malcolm Reed in the mess hall.

"Yeah!" Mayweather said, animated, shoving his tray aside and sitting forward in his seat as he glanced between his two senior officers. "Every three years, every Boomer ship that's within range converges on the Ceti Beta system--a lot of the trade routes intersect near there--and they spend a few days swapping stories, testing engineering upgrades, and running races."

"What kind of races?" Reed said, clearly intrigued. It was hard to imagine the lumbering cargo haulers dodging through Ceti Beta's dense asteroid field, but Tucker had learned never to underestimate Boomers.

"All kinds," Mayweather replied. "Everything from maneuvering the haulers around an obstacle course, to detaching the drive sections and doing seventy laps around a track laid out between marker buoys, to low-impulse shuttlepod races." He paused, eyes wide with excitement. "D'you think the captain would make a detour? Drop me off?"

Tucker threw his head back and cackled. "Hell, Travis, just try keepin' him away! When he hears about this, he's going to want to enter himself."

Mayweather looked dubious. "I don't know about that. I know we've been working with some of the cargo haulers this last year or so, but a lot of Boomers are still pretty wary of Starfleet..."

"Nothing wrong with a little healthy competition, Ensign," Reed said, a smile pulling at the corners of his lips. "We couldn't enter _Enterprise,_ of course, but it'd be an ideal opportunity to try out those modifications you've been making to the shuttlepods." This last was addressed to Tucker.

Tucker nodded, chewing thoughtfully on his steak. "It's as good a test as we're going to get."

"What do you say, Travis?" Reed nudged the helmsman playfully with his elbow. "Think we could give your Boomer friends a run for their money?"

Mayweather's grin widened. Reed's joshing had obviously awakened the helmsman's competitive streak. "I bet we could."

* * *

"I fail to see the purpose of flying a shuttlepod at high velocity on a torturous route through an asteroid field," Commander T'Pol intoned solemnly from her bridge station.

Captain Jonathan Archer stood by his chair in the command well, shaking his head indulgently as Ensign Hoshi Sato turned around from her communications console. "It's a guy thing," she said in a stage whisper, leaning conspiratorially toward T'Pol.

From his position at tactical, Reed arched a skeptical eyebrow at her. "Oh, really, Ensign? In that case, why did my petrolhead sister compete in the British rally championship for four years running?"

"She must be the exception that proves the rule, Lieutenant," Sato retorted, smiling sweetly at him across the bridge.

Archer saw T'Pol's brow furrow almost imperceptibly as she struggled to decipher the logic of her subordinate's statement.

"Don't even try, T'Pol," Tucker advised from his position beside Reed's station. "It's just a human expression."

"We do it to test ourselves," Archer explained, pacing forward to stand in front of T'Pol's station. "Against the technology, against the course, and against each other." His eyes danced as he bit back a grin. "And because it's _fun_."

"Our assigned mission is to explore this sector of space, not to have fun," T'Pol reminded him patiently.

Archer sighed, smiling to himself as he observed the rest of his bridge officers trying unsuccessfully to suppress a set of matching grins. It was good to see them relaxing like this. They'd had a tense couple of months, first of all surviving, with _Columbia_ 'shelp, an encounter with their old friends--the "little green men," as Mayweather and Phlox had taken to calling them--and a Romulan ship. Then they'd spent a couple of weeks helping Shran and the Andorians settle a group of Suliban refugees. That had been followed by a long period of...well, nothing much, really. But even patrolling empty space with only a few particles of interstellar dust to break the monotony had somehow been exhausting, especially when they were half expecting a Romulan fleet to be hiding inside every other nebula.

They were all getting just a touch of cabin fever. Archer knew that Tucker had taken to tinkering with the shuttlepods, having already tweaked the warp engine to within an inch of its life, and the last time he'd visited the armory, Reed's torpedoes had been so shiny that he'd wished he'd brought his sunglasses. And only yesterday, he'd happened to glance out of his ready room window and realized from the way the stars were moving that Mayweather must be looping the loop. Again.

They needed a break, and this Boomer Grand Prix seemed like the ideal opportunity. Hernandez and _Columbia_ could explore on their own for a while. "There's no reason we can't do both," he said, with a distinct feeling of deja vu. How many times had he explained this to their Vulcan colleague? "We've been out on patrol for a few months now, and I think we could all use a little R&R. We're going, assuming the Boomers are happy for us to be there. Think of it as a good opportunity to learn a little more about this particular subset of humans, as well as giving our resident, er, petrolheads a chance to let off a little steam." He glanced over at Mayweather, seated as usual at the helm, and at Reed. Both men were now grinning happily at the prospect of entering the races. Archer turned back to the two women. "You two might as well try to enjoy yourselves."

T'Pol simply arched one elegant eyebrow, and Sato shook her head indulgently. "I'm sure we'll find some way of amusing ourselves, sir," she murmured.

* * *

"Travis reckons his brother's got a good chance of winning this one," Tucker observed, leaning back in his chair. He and Archer were ensconced in the captain's mess, along with a case of beer. The first race was to be a time trial, and each participating Boomer vessel in turn would offload its own cargo containers and dock with a standard mass of ballast. Then each ship in turn would negotiate an intricate, predetermined course across the system.

As Mayweather had predicted, the Boomers had been a little wary and even somewhat hostile when _Enterprise_ arrived at Ceti Beta. They were a fiercely independent bunch, and as Mayweather's brother Paul had pointed out, they didn't like what they perceived as Starfleet trying to muscle in on _their_ activities, professional or social. It had taken all of Archer's diplomatic skills to convince them that there was no ulterior motive--that the _Enterprise_ crew only wanted to indulge in a little friendly competition. They would let the Boomers decide whether it was as spectators or participants. But Mayweather had conjectured that the only reason he and Reed were now preparing Shuttlepod One for the competition was that Archer had agreed to show the races on the big screen in the mess hall, and had offered _Enterprise_ 'shospitality to any of the Boomers who wanted to watch. Real food and space for leisure activities were at a premium on Boomer ships, and it seemed that most of them were at least curious about Starfleet's flagship. Many were prepared to take advantage of the offer of a change of scene.

"We'll have someone to cheer for, then," Archer said, giving Tucker a small salute with his beer bottle. "Are Travis and Malcolm watching with the others in the mess hall?"

"Nah, they're still workin' on the 'pod. Travis says he isn't real interested in the time trials--not enough speed for him."

"Still a pretty grueling test of a pilot's skill, though. Have you seen the course? It'll take them at least twenty minutes of hard maneuvering to get through it."

"Why d'you think I'm up here watching it with you?

Archer regarded his friend thoughtfully. "I'm surprised you aren't copiloting for Travis. The 'pod's your baby, after all."

Tucker shook his head. "Malcolm's got that seat pretty much sewn up. Besides, engineers don't make great racing pilots. You've got to be prepared to push the engine that little bit harder, to break the engine to win the race. That just doesn't feel right to an engineer."

"I wonder..." Archer mused.

"What?" Tucker grinned. He could see a plan forming in his captain's mind.

"How about you and I enter the second 'pod? I'm sure we could get it ready in time..."

Tucker winced and rubbed nervously at the back of his neck. Even though Archer was the captain, he was still a typical pilot. He never could resist a race. "Jon, I really don't think that's a good idea. Some of the Boomers still don't completely trust us: I reckon they only accepted Travis and Malcolm entering 'cause of Travis's connection to the _Horizon_." At Archer's crestfallen expression, he sighed. "And think about it--don't you think that Travis might be a little intimidated, racing against his captain?"

"But I wouldn't..." Archer protested.

"I know, Jon, but he might decide he had to let you beat him."

Archer sighed. "You're right, Trip." He gazed at Tucker with more than a hint of pride in his eyes. "You're going to make a fine captain one day." Archer grinned as Tucker felt a blush rise to his cheeks at the unexpected praise. "I guess we can let the pride of Starfleet rest on Malcolm and Travis's shoulders, just this once," Archer finished with a smile.

"Look," Tucker said, indicating the screen, "the first ship's pulling up to the start line."

They turned their attention to the events unfolding before them.

* * *

Hoshi Sato sighed quietly to herself as the turbolift doors slid open to reveal a corridor bustling with both members of the crew and visiting Boomers. She wondered briefly if there was a single quiet hideaway left on _Enterprise_. It was all very well for the captain to hold an open house, but it meant the already cramped ship was bursting at the seams. She had been heading for the hydroponics bay in the hope of some peace and quiet, far away from any mention of racing, but just then she spied Ensign Moreno ushering a chattering group of visitors inside, and she reluctantly changed her mind.

She stepped out of the turbolift in any case, allowing a mixed bunch of scientists and engineers to enter, and shouldered her way out into the crowd. Why did every single one of the Boomers have to be at least twenty centimeters taller than her? Even the women. She'd heard that most Boomer captains kept the gravity plating set a little lighter than Earth's natural gravity, and she guessed that had caused the second generation of Boomers to grow up tall and willowy. Every time she'd stepped out of her quarters today, she'd found herself with her face in someone's chest, and continually having to crane her neck to see over people's shoulders was becoming tedious.

She wasn't sure exactly where she was heading--sickbay, perhaps, although Phlox was busy treating a steady stream of minor injuries and illnesses among the visiting Boomers. She suppressed a shudder as she recalled the way Phlox had spent dinner the previous evening describing in loving detail some unfortunate Boomer captain's case of hemorrhoids. No, sickbay was not a good idea right now. Perhaps the stellar cartography lab would be empty, considering they weren't exactly going anywhere.

"Um...excuse me?" a voice said tentatively.

Sato stopped and turned as she felt someone tap her shoulder. She glanced up, but not uncomfortably far up, she noticed, into a pair of warm brown eyes. "I'm looking for the mess hall," the young man said in a pleasant baritone. "I wanted to watch the race. Am I on the right deck?"

"Oh," Sato said, "no, the mess hall is on E deck. We're on D deck. You'll need to go down one level."

The owner of the wonderful eyes smiled, revealing a row of even white teeth. "So many decks," he said. "It's so confusing. On my ship, we only have two."

"And what ship are you from?" she smiled back, fluttering her eyelashes a little. She'd always found subtlety to be vastly underrated where men were concerned. Well, the captain _had_ told her to find some way of amusing herself, and this young man certainly looked...amusing.

"The _ECS Magellan_ ," he said. "I'm Adonis Kyrellis, the pilot."

"Well, Adonis," she said, linking her arm through his, " _I_ am Hoshi Sato, and I'll be your navigator for today. We'd can't have you getting lost again."

As Sato steered him toward the turbolift, she had a feeling she might just develop an interest in racing after all.

* * *

Travis Mayweather hurried along the corridor toward the mess hall, leaving Malcolm Reed to trail in his wake. He'd told Commander Tucker he wasn't really interested in the time trials for the loaded cargo haulers, but that didn't mean he wasn't going to watch his brother, Paul, compete. He and Reed had spent most of the day stripping out any unnecessary weight from Shuttlepod One in preparation for the qualifying session the next day that would determine their starting position for the race proper. Although the race was conducted in virtually zero gravity, a lower mass meant lower inertia, making maneuvering faster and more efficient.

He wiped his grimy hands on his even grimier uniform before pressing his thumb against the control that would open the mess hall doors. At least his mom wouldn't be there to see the state he was in. As the _Horizon_ 's engineer, she would be the only crew member besides Paul still on board for the race--those were the rules, as far as he remembered.

The doors opened to reveal a crowd bigger than any Mayweather had ever seen on _Enterprise,_ even when they'd celebrated holidays like New Year's and Thanksgiving, for which virtually the whole crew had turned out. The room was oppressively hot. All the tables were occupied--they'd set the room up cafe style, rather than in rows, to allow everyone to talk and mingle--and even the extra seating that the stewards had provided along the sides of the room had been taken. He spotted Sato at one of the tables, deep in conversation with a young man he didn't recognize, and he waved briefly toward his sister and her husband, who were seated on the far side of the room with the rest of their crew. He planned to catch up over dinner with Alyssa and Ken later, along with Paul and their mom. He felt a little stab of sorrow as he realized that his dad was no longer around to witness this, their first family reunion since Mayweather had joined _Enterprise_.

"Hey, Travis--over there," Reed said, tugging at his arm and distracting him from his sudden melancholy. Reed steered him toward a small gap in the crowd near the back wall, over by the serving hatches. They'd have to stand, but they'd have a good view of the screen. Maybe he could even snag something to eat while he watched. He was absolutely starving. "What's happening?" Reed asked.

Mayweather indicated the screen, which currently showed the _Horizon_ 's drive section moving into the docking position. "The commentary should start soon," he said. They were taking an audio feed from the _ECS Sojourner--_ although she didn't take part herself, sportswoman Elizabeth Franklin traditionally provided an entertaining and knowledgeable commentary throughout the race meeting. "He's dropped off his regular load, and he's going to dock with that one--twenty kilotonnes, give or take a few, evenly distributed among eight cargo containers in a four-by-two configuration. The route is marked out through the asteroid field, kind of like a slalom course for skiing on Earth. It's different from the one we'll be using, so don't bother taking notes." Reed smiled ruefully. "They can't deviate from the course or hit any asteroids, and they can't stop. They have an engineer on board. They are allowed to make running repairs so long as they don't come to a complete halt while they're doing it."

Reed nodded, indicating he understood, as Elizabeth Franklin's voice came over the comm system. "And next up we have Paul and Rhianna Mayweather," she said. "This is only the second time that Paul has piloted the _Horizon_ in this competition, but his father, James, won both the obstacle course and the big race back in '46, and with Rhianna on board, Paul has every chance of repeating that success. Last time, Paul came in a respectable third in this event, so he'll be hoping to improve on that this time around. With only Marina Xavier in the _Faraday_ to race after him, there's everything to play for--but Marina won this event three years ago, and we shouldn't count her out just yet."

"The big race?" Reed said, glancing away from the screen for a moment.

"Tomorrow, after the 'pod races," Mayweather explained, "the unloaded drive sections do seventy laps around the system. It's about pure speed."

They watched the screen as the _Horizon_ moved up into the starting position, and then there was a brief laser blast from the _Sojourner_ , signaling the start.

* * *

"So, does your family run the _Magellan_?" Sato asked Adonis as the _Horizon_ moved into the asteroid field.

He shook his head. "I've only been with them for about a year."

"Were you raised on another ship?"

"No, on Earth. Greece."

"So how did you end up with the Boomers?" she said, intrigued. She'd placed his accent as Greek almost from the moment he'd opened his mouth--northern Greece, if she wasn't mistaken, near the Macedonian border, as if his looks and his name hadn't provided enough of a clue. But she wanted to keep him talking, preferably about himself.

"I was working as a pilot--on the Earth-Mars run, mostly, but I wanted to see a little more of the universe. The _Magellan_ 's pilot jumped ship the last time they dropped a cargo load back on Earth, and I heard about it, and the rest is history."

"You never thought of joining Starfleet?" Sato asked. "We do get to see a fair bit of the universe, you know."

Another negative, this time accompanied by a smile. "I just want to fly. How did you come to join up?"

"Languages," she said, laughing a little, mostly at herself. But she was enjoying this man's company, and the way they were being pressed together by the crowd. "I'm very, very good at languages. But most of the linguistic work on Earth now is academic, or it's being done by linguists who are more like archaeologists, translating old documents and trying to preserve dying languages."

Adonis nodded thoughtfully.

"The real excitement for a linguist is out here, in the field," Sato continued, "trying to find ways to communicate with beings who've never even seen humans before, who might not even use words as we understand them..." She trailed off as she noticed Adonis gazing at her strangely. "What?" she asked anxiously, rubbing at her nose. "Do I have something on my face?" Suddenly she felt self-conscious.

"No," Adonis said, his smile widening and his dark eyes twinkling. "It's just that when you talk about your work, you...light up inside. You glow. You're very passionate about it, I can see."

That's not all I hope to be passionate about, she thought, blushing a little as she bit back the words.

"I feel the same about flying," Adonis continued. "That's why I'm entering the race tomorrow."

"Oh, really? The shuttlepod race?" Sato said, thinking of Mayweather and Reed. With the pride of the ship at stake, she would feel guilty if she didn't support them.

"The _big_ race," he corrected her. She raised an inquiring eyebrow. "Seventy laps around the system at warp speed," he explained. "They tell me there's no feeling like it. I can't wait to try."

Sato laughed softly to herself. She'd just discovered the thing that made Adonis light up inside.

* * *

Travis Mayweather held his breath as he watched the _Horizon_ enter the final section of the course. So far, Paul had set the fastest time--by all of ten seconds--for the first part of the course, but he'd fallen behind a little by the halfway point. He'd made up some time over the third section, until he was neck and neck with the time set earlier by the _Stargazer._ But now he was in the most difficult section of the course, with faster-moving, spinning asteroids, and the marker buoys were much closer together than before, making for some incredibly tight turns. Clipping an asteroid or going outside the marker buoys would mean immediate disqualification, so the balance between speed and accuracy was crucial.

"This final section is where Paul came unstuck last time," Elizabeth Franklin reminded her audience. "But he's had three years to practice since then, and we've already seen how much his maneuvering has improved. But can he keep up the speed he'll need to come out in front?"

Mayweather risked a glance over at the other side of the room, where his sister, Alyssa, and her husband, Ken, were sitting, noticing as he did so that Reed's attention was riveted to what was happening on the screen. Alyssa turned and caught his eye, giving him a brief, nervous smile and a nod of encouragement.

The seconds ticked by. One corner of the screen showed the fastest time so far, the time the _Horizon_ had to beat. In the other corner was the time elapsed so far, the numbers ticking inexorably upward.

They weren't going to make it, Mayweather was sure. Paul was too slow, too careful. There was less than a minute left if he was going to beat the _Stargazer_ 's time, and there was a large, dense asteroid right in his path, blocking the way to the finish line. The Horizon would have to go around it, and there wasn't enough time. But instead, as Mayweather watched, the _Horizon_ began to pick up speed, heading directly toward the massive rock that was blocking its path.

"What the hell is he doing?" Reed murmured, sotto voce.

Mayweather gripped his friend's shoulder, his heart rate rising. It looked suicidal, but it might just work, if Paul could pull it off. If he couldn't, the _Horizon_ would most likely collide with the asteroid, causing serious damage to the ship, and possibly worse. He could see Alyssa on the edge of her seat, leaning forward, gripping Ken's hand, and he knew that she'd realized what their brother was about to attempt. The three of them had occasionally seen their father perform this maneuver, but James had been a much more experienced pilot than Paul.

Paul waited until the last possible moment before he cut the engine, and the crowd in the mess hall drew in a collective gasp as the _Horizon_ was caught in the asteroid's gravity, swinging around in a slingshot until, at exactly the right moment, Paul lit up the engine again and accelerated across the finishing line.

"He did it!" Mayweather breathed, his eyes fixed on the timers displayed on the screen. Paul's crazy stunt had allowed the _Horizon_ to shave nearly two seconds off the _Stargazer_ 's time.

"Does this mean he's won?" Reed shouted over the cheers that had erupted all around them. Alyssa, hugging Ken, gave Mayweather a delighted thumbs-up over her husband's shoulder.

"It means he's in the lead," Mayweather yelled back, unable to wipe the grin off his face as various Boomers slapped him heartily on the shoulder. "There's still one more ship to make the run, but he's beaten the _Faraday_ 's time from last year--and that's amazing!"

"I take it you want to stay and watch the final run, then?" Reed's eyes twinkled with amusement.

"Try and drag me away!" Mayweather replied.

Thirty minutes later, the mess hall was silent once again as Boomers and Starfleet personnel alike watched the _Faraday_ 's journey through the asteroid field. Marina Xavier was the same age as Rhianna Mayweather and had far more experience as a pilot than Paul. And it showed. She had slowly demolished his time over the first part of the course and was doing well in the second. Mayweather's heart pounded in his throat. Had Paul's daredevil maneuver been for nothing?

And then the unthinkable happened. The _Faraday_ 's starboard thrusters misfired, pushing the big cargo hauler off course and into the path of a fast-moving asteroid. Xavier tried to compensate, but she wasn't fast enough, and the asteroid clipped one of the cargo containers.

The mess hall erupted once again. The _Horizon_ had won! Mayweather grabbed the nearest person and hugged him, belatedly realizing it was Reed. But the normally straightlaced armory officer didn't seem to mind, and even hugged him back enthusiastically. The Mayweather clan would really have something to celebrate over dinner tonight. His dad would have been proud of them.

* * *

"Thrusters?" Mayweather inquired, staring down at the preflight checklist on the PADD he held on his left hand.

"I believe we have two," Reed replied laconically, making a great show of rising from his seat and glancing out of each of the shuttlepod's side windows in turn. That earned him a mock scowl from Mayweather, and Reed grinned cheekily back at him before reporting that both thrusters were fully charged and operational. His young friend had been beginning to take this race altogether too seriously. It was supposed to be fun, after all.

Reed himself was relishing his role as navigator and copilot. Many years ago, while he and his sister, Madeline, had both been at university, he'd performed the same function for her when she'd raced ground cars, calling out turns and distances as they hurtled at breakneck speed along muddy tracks in various parts of the British countryside. He smiled fondly as he recalled that Maddy still habitually drove like a rally driver.

He'd learned back then to take the strongest motion-sickness medication available before a race, and he'd already visited the doctor that morning, both for that and, unfortunately, the doctor's patented hangover cure. There had been a bit of a party on board the _Horizon_ the night before, to celebrate Paul and Rhianna's victory, and Mayweather had dragged Reed along, although in truth he hadn't put up much of a fight. But as a result he was feeling a little delicate this morning, although Mayweather himself seemed perky enough.

As he had back when he'd been Maddy's codriver, he'd studied the course carefully--although in this instance he hadn't been able to walk it--and made copious notes. These he had handwritten on cards that were now safely tucked in his top pocket. He preferred not to rely on PADDs for this sort of thing--the data storage devices were too slow and cumbersome for the sort of quick reference he would need.

"You ready?" Mayweather asked, turning to him once they had finished the checklist.

"As ready as I'll ever be," Reed replied, taking his seat and strapping in as Mayweather headed for the start line.

They had one chance at this--one lap in which to set a time that would determine their starting position for tomorrow's race. Reed knew they were at a disadvantage. Certainly they had better equipment--a standard, commercially available shuttlepod was rated for one-quarter impulse, as were those from _Enterprise,_ but Tucker's modifications meant that the small ship was theoretically capable of something approaching 0.3 impulse speed. But he was certain that the Boomer engineers would have made improvements to their ships too, and besides, Mayweather and Reed had never flown this course before, whereas most of the Boomer pilots had.

They'd waited until late in the qualifying session before making their run, partly to give themselves a time to aim for, and partly in the hope that most of the dozen or so other competing shuttlepods would have cleared the course by then. Their strategy had been partly successful; with only ten minutes of the hour-long qualifying session left, there were still three other shuttlepods on the course, but the _Enterprise_ crew couldn't afford to leave it any longer.

"Here goes!" said Mayweather, and Reed was thrown back in his seat as the shuttlepod accelerated across the start line, the inertial dampers not quite able to compensate quickly enough.

Reed yanked the stack of cards out of his pocket, his eyes flicking between them and the readouts on the console in front of him and all but ignoring the view out of the shuttlepod's bubble window.

"Hard port, four hundred meters," Reed called as they closed rapidly in on the first marker buoy. He felt the inertia change as Mayweather made the turn. This was trickier than driving a rally car, he realized. Trees and rocks didn't tend to move about on the track the way the asteroids did on this course. Mayweather would have to look out for those, and any stray shuttlepods still on the course, all by himself. Another difference was that ground cars could only be steered in one of two directions--left or right--whereas this course had been laid out in three dimensions. The two of them had had to develop a more efficient shorthand than the traditional spherical coordinates in order to specify course corrections quickly, and now they were putting that system to the test.

Reed breathed in involuntarily as Mayweather skimmed past the first Boomer shuttlepod with just centimeters to spare, then yelled out another course correction. He risked a glance at Mayweather and noticed that the helmsman's brows were knit together in concentration.

Mayweather danced the shuttlepod around three more small, wildly spinning asteroids, setting it on an upward trajectory to pass inside the next marker buoy. They were on the home stretch. Reed glanced at the timer. They were close to the leader's time, but not close enough to beat it.

"Down, down, down!" Reed yelled, and with one final turn they crossed the finish line.

Mayweather shut down the engine and turned to Reed, grinning.

"That was a wild ride, Travis," Reed said, a little breathless, as if he had actually run the race, as opposed to sitting in a shuttlepod.

The pilot's console bleeped as a message came in. "It's our official time," Mayweather said, and Reed craned over his shoulder to see.

"Third!" he said, not sure whether to be pleased or disappointed.

"Not bad," Mayweather said with a nonchalant shrug. "Come on, let's get back to the _Horizon--_ my mom got a roast from Chef, and she's fixing it for lunch."

Reed smiled indulgently. Mayweather always had enjoyed his food.

* * *

"Wow!" Tucker cackled as the results came up on the screen in the captain's mess. "I always knew Travis could fly circles around everyone else."

"That's our boy," Archer grinned, a little fatherly pride in his eyes as he took a hearty bite of his cheese sandwich.

"So he and Malcolm are in with a chance tomorrow--twenty laps and only two other ships to pass..."

"Who will both be making themselves as tall and as wide as possible," Archer reminded him, after swallowing. "And there'll also be nine other ships trying to overtake them."

Tucker nodded, still confident that Mayweather and Reed wouldn't let _Enterprise_ down. As he watched the current grid positions come up on the screen, in the background he could see another ship approaching the starting line.

"Hey!" he said. "Who's that?"

Archer peered at the screen. "They don't have much time left to qualify, whoever they are," he observed.

"And now we have a surprise second entry from _Enterprise,_ " Elizabeth Franklin's voice came over the audio feed.

"What?" Tucker said as the shuttlepod entered the course. He turned to Archer. "Did you know about this?"

Archer shook his head, frowning a little.

They watched the screen intently as the little ship made its way through the asteroid field, following the same course that Mayweather and the others had taken. The flying was precise and efficient, using all of the course but never slipping outside of the marker buoys, but it lacked Mayweather's flair. At last the shuttlepod crossed the finish line with just seconds to spare before the qualifying session closed.

"And _Enterprise_ 's second team will line up fifth on the grid tomorrow," Elizabeth Franklin announced.

"Not if I have anything to do with it," Tucker muttered darkly as Franklin closed out her commentary with a complete list of the grid positions and a reminder that qualifying for the big race would take place that afternoon.

"Trip?"

"I never authorized having both shuttlepods out of action at the same time," Tucker explained. "It effectively leaves us without ship-to-ship transport."

Archer made a moue as he considered. "It's only for a morning, Trip," he said, attempting to placate the disgruntled engineer. "We could use them stripped down in a real emergency. And besides, now we've doubled our chances of winning that race tomorrow. That's worth a little inconvenience, don't you think?"

* * *

Tucker strode purposefully through the corridors that led from the captain's mess to the launch bay, a mulish expression on his face. The crew member or members who had taken Shuttlepod Two out today certainly hadn't cleared it with him, and although Archer had laughed it off, especially since the mysterious newcomers had qualified just behind Mayweather and Reed on the starting grid, Tucker was determined to give them a piece of his mind. One shuttlepod stripped down and out of commission for regular transportation duties was a risk when they might be called away at any moment to deal with an emergency. Two were completely unacceptable. And the shuttlepods were his responsibility, no matter what Archer said.

He reached the launch bay, only to stop short as the doors slid open just as he was reaching for the controls.

"T'Pol!" he said, surprised to find her in this part of the ship. Come to think of it, he'd hardly seen her at all in the last few days. He guessed she must be feeling pretty uncomfortable with all the extra people on board, and he had somehow assumed that she had been holed up in her room, meditating or something. But what was she doing here? Had she heard about the second shuttlepod entering the race and preempted him? As first officer, disciplinary matters were her responsibility, and he'd look pretty silly storming in there if she'd already taken care of it.

"So, who's on report?" he asked, feeling suddenly deflated.

"I beg your pardon, Commander?" she replied, arching a questioning eyebrow at him.

"The person who took out Shuttlepod Two without permission," he clarified. "Who was it? Rostov? Henderson? It's got to be someone with a lot of experience to fly that well," he mused. That narrowed the field a little.

"The person concerned did have permission," she explained patiently. "From me."

"Huh?" That took the wind completely out of his sails. Why would this mysterious person ask T'Pol, rather than him? It didn't make sense. He sighed. "So, who is it, then? Whoever they are, they're going to give Travis and Malcolm a run for their money."

"The captain did instruct us to make the most of this opportunity," she pointed out. "But the person competing in Shuttlepod Two wishes to remain anonymous," she said, forestalling his next question.

He scrubbed a hand across his face, frustrated at being overruled on this twice in one day, but finally resigned to losing this battle. "Well, I guess we'll just have to cheer for Travis and Malcolm _and_ the mysterious second team tomorrow."

With a brief nod of assent, she moved off swiftly down the corridor.

* * *

Hoshi Sato woke slowly, stretching her arms above her head in her narrow bunk and wriggling her toes even before she opened her eyes. There was at least one advantage to being one of the smallest people on _Enterprise_ , she mused. For her, the standard bunk was almost roomy. She couldn't imagine how someone as tall as Commander Tucker coped--probably by bumping his head or stubbing his toes on a regular basis as he woke, she decided. Maybe that was why Captain Archer's cabin featured a large double bed in the center of the room. And of course, the captain had to have room for Porthos in his bed too.

She smiled to herself as she noticed the slight ache in some of her muscles. The day before, she'd watched the qualifying session for the big race with bated breath, hoping that Adonis would achieve his ambition. He'd finished a respectable fourth on the starting grid from a field of ten, which meant he still had a realistic chance of winning the race. It was an outstanding performance for his first time racing that type of ship, and he'd returned to _Enterprise_ in a euphoric mood. They'd shared a late dinner, and when Adonis had claimed to be too wired to sleep, Sato had offered to help him find a way to unwind.

She enjoyed Adonis's company, and on _Enterprise_ , the opportunity for a little intimate human companionship didn't come along very often. She'd made it a policy not to become involved with any of her crewmates, even though the men outnumbered the women two to one. A relationship with a coworker with whom she would have to live and work day in, day out, was just too fraught with potential difficulties, as Commanders Tucker and T'Pol, if the rumors had been true, had found out the hard way. But Adonis was different. She had no illusions about them entering into a long-term or long-distance relationship. She supposed there was an outside chance she might see him again once the race was over--say, in another three years--but she wasn't counting on it. This was just a nice interlude--for both of them, she hoped.

She rolled over sleepily, expecting to encounter the warm, solid form of the man who had shared her bed last night, but she was surprised to find only crumpled sheets. Puzzled, she reluctantly opened her eyes and peered into the starlit gloom. She'd hoped Adonis would stay for breakfast at least. And then she saw him, silhouetted against the light from her terminal, and she smiled, rubbing her eyes sleepily.

"Mmm," she murmured, still mostly asleep. "What are you doing?"

Adonis startled at the sound of her voice, switching off the screen as he turned to face her. "Hi," he said. "I was just checking in with my ship. I didn't mean to wake you."

"You didn't," she yawned, then she frowned a little. She was sure she'd locked her terminal after logging out the night before, although she had been a little distracted. She shrugged, laughing inwardly at herself. If she wasn't careful, she'd soon become almost as paranoid as Lieutenant Reed. The Boomers weren't a threat; they were allies. Humans. And Captain Archer had already given hordes of them virtually unlimited access to the ship. If any of them had wanted to cause havoc, they wouldn't need to get into her quarters to do it. "Come back to bed," she suggested. "It's early."

Adonis's white teeth were revealed by his slow grin as he crossed the room. "Now there's an offer I can't refuse," he said as he leaned down to kiss her.

* * *

Sato stole a glance at the clock as she sat at her bridge station, dickering with the comm system. The previous day she'd noticed some distortion in the audio feed from the Kearneys' ship, and she wanted to see if she could clean it up before the shuttlepod race began. She smiled to herself as she worked: she did want to cheer Mayweather and Reed on, after all. _Enterprise_ 's honor was at stake.

The distortion was probably being caused by the Boomer ship's inferior communications antenna, she thought, but a little judicious tweaking on her part would probably clear it right up. In fact, she had a program that would probably do the trick. She'd found it way back when she was at STC, and she had used it a great deal when they'd been practicing on the grainy old audio transmissions from the Apollo missions. She remembered how proud she'd felt the day she'd found the infamous missing "a" in Neil Armstrong"s famous quote as he stepped onto the lunar surface: "This is one small step for a man; one giant leap for mankind."

The program was very old, dating back to the first years of subspace communications, but she'd modified and improved it over the years, and she'd always found it worked extremely well on messages that had come through older-style systems. Every time _Enterprise_ had been refitted, she'd always made sure some eager-beaver technician hadn't deleted it in the mistaken belief that it was obsolete.

She entered her access code and brought up the program, frowning a little as she noticed from the log the last time it had been accessed--in the early hours of that morning. Well, _she_ hadn't used it--she had been very much otherwise engaged at the time, she recalled with a smile at the memory. So who else could have accessed it? Who else even knew it was here? Had Crewman Baird, her gamma shift counterpart, preempted her idea to tackle the audio distortion? She doubted the man could even hear it, let alone given any thought to fixing it.

Her frown deepened as she checked the log again, looking to see precisely what the activity had been that had caused the program to open, and she was surprised to discover that it had been downloaded and copied. It hadn't been an automated backup of the database: it had happened at entirely the wrong time for that, and besides, they only affected data files, not software. She didn't actually mind that someone had decided to make a copy--it had originated as open-source software long before she'd been born--but she wished whoever it was had told her first. After all, communications were her remit, and if someone had an idea that might improve them...

Slightly irritated, she dug a little deeper, trying to find out who had made the copy. The only person she could think of was Commander T'Pol, but that seemed unlikely. That was odd, she thought as she examined the log again. There was no access code attached to the copying activity, which meant...

Which meant someone must have hacked into the database and stolen the program. She closed her eyes and sighed. This was a mystery. Who would want to steal a decades-old program that was already freely available--that she would have freely given if asked? It didn't make any sense. Unless...She quickly brought up the previous day's comm data. That had been copied too. And the data from the day before that.

She went back a week. A year. All their mission logs. All their communications with Starfleet and other ships. All their maps and scientific analyses. Everything had been copied at some point during the night.


End file.
